Mayor Anton Ederveen van Valkenswaard had his very last working day on Tuesday. After 18 years, one of the longest -serving civilian masters in Brabant stops. But he got so devoted to the village that he no longer wants to leave. “Next year I will celebrate carnival here.”
When Ederveen came to Valkenswaard eighteen years ago, he was the youngest mayor of the Netherlands with 35 years. People in his area sometimes asked him what he started. “I soon heard around me that it was not the expectation that I would stay for a long time. Many thought I would continue soon. But I have always been someone who anchores himself in the area where I live and work. And if that works out, it will be long.
What he will certainly not miss are the threats to his person. More than ten years ago, due to his harsh approach to drug crime and the closing of drug premises, he even threatened with death. Ederveen was never scared.
“I was one of the first to act hard against drug crime. Those drug buildings closed. I wanted to be a mayor who stands for the safety of his inhabitants. I remember that we have started a number of weekends with drug dogs in the hospitality industry, that was unique”. He received the biggest compliment from parents who said through you performing my children can safely go out.
In recent days, the mayor held some sort of farewell tour. That felt like a warm bath for him, with more than seven hundred cookies and more than a thousand people. “The reactions were of enormous gratitude, that made me emotional. You notice that you touched people. Then you know that you did something right.”
On his last working day, Ederveen visited a couple who had been married for 75 years. It is precisely those contacts with people he will miss. Because the mayor enjoyed visits like that. “I hope my successor will continue to do that,” he says.
If Ederveen closes the door of the town hall with some nostalgia on Tuesday evening, it is definitely over. He continues to live with his family in Valkenswaard and has no ambition to become mayor somewhere else. What he will do, he doesn’t know yet. “But next year I can fully celebrate carnival,” he says laughing. And for that he is in Striepersgat in any case.